Most articles about landing pages will tell you what content you need on a landing page to succeed. But they don’t usually tell you how long that content should be. If you’re new to the concept of landing pages in marketing campaigns, let’s do a quick checklist:

What is a Landing Page?

A landing page is a website page your visitor “lands” on after being directed from another source–your home page, your business card, your social media update, a blog post, a billboard sign. They either click or type in the specific URL you’ve designated and bam, they’re on your landing page.

Landing Pages Have One Goal In Mind…Usually

Landing pages often hide the website navigation, or they’re hosted somewhere else, with a domain name dedicated to this product or service under the larger company umbrella. The reason why they don’t have navigation is because they are funneling prospects through to the Call to Action, one single action they want the prospect to take. This highly focused funnel delivers higher conversions.

Elements of a Great Landing Page Include:

Story: your target customer’s journey story (how to get from pain point A to solution B to experience benefit C)

Authority and Trust: social proof, such as customer testimonials, a running tally of how many people have purchased or subscribed, media endorsements

Benefits: a list of benefits

Features: a partial list of features

A Call to Action: one single strong CTA, such as a purchase button

Who Is Selling: an About paragraph that demonstrates who is behind the product or service and why they’re equipped to lead that solution

It looks straightforward. Plus, there are tons of landing page template services out there for you to buy into, drag-and-drop your info in minutes, and make a generic page that has tested well in the mediocre world of Internet Marketing and yes, it will probably get you some results.

But I recommend you or your designer try to customize a landing page or build one from scratch to provide a delightful, uniquely branded experience for your prospect.

What stops landing pages from getting off the ground quickly is business owners can’t decide on content length.

How long should your landing page copy be? Half a page above the fold? Seven printout pages? <–I’ve seen these and everything in between.

To help you create accurate content for your landing page in your next marketing campaign, here are some questions and insights for you to consider.

Questions to Ask Before Writing Your Landing Page

1. Where does the landing page fall in the sales process?

2. How many steps are in the overall sales process? Should it or can it be shortened or lengthened to build a solid customer relationship?

4. Who EXACTLY will be reading it? If you have multiple target markets, does it make sense for higher conversions to make multiple landing pages that speak precisely to each customer persona?

5. Why are you selling this product/service?

6. Why are you solving this problem for this customer and how will you talk about that in your landing page?

7. What mood or atmosphere will you create with your language? How will people feel when they’re reading it? Happy, fearful, provoked, excited?

8. Which words are overplayed in your industry that you can ban from your landing page copy?

9. How will you surprise or delight the person reading the copy? What surprising numbers or facts do you want to reveal that shed light on their pain points or on the solution?

10. Why is this product or service better or more unique than others?

Short Landing Pages

Short landing pages are perfect for: email opt-ins and lead magnets, event announcements with paid tickets, or smaller priced items under $25.

Design the landing page and write the copy, knowing your challenge is getting 75% of your crucial information above the fold. Also keep in mind that on all landing pages regardless of length, you have a majority percentage of people viewing on their smartphones or tablets, so don’t use any kind of multiple field form as your Call to Action. Use a button. This can even lead to a form on the next page if you want a 3-step checkout process.

Every word counts on a short landing page. You will want to write multiple headlines and call to action button copy and test them in an initial user pool during your first 2-3 days of launch. (That is, if you don’t have the luxury of a research or user testing group prior to launch.)

You can also use long landing page elements broken up into emails and use a short landing page as an opt in to start sending prospects those chunks of landing page elements by daily or weekly email, ensuring they’ll open and digest smaller pieces of information.

Long Landing Pages

Long landing pages are for your prospects who may be shy about being on the phone or conversing through email and want to make a bigger purchase decision or commitment with your company via your landing page.

If you have higher priced items–a subscription service, a course that lasts more than 4 weeks, or a service that includes a multiple step process–you want to write a longer landing page.

You can design this landing page so that the pieces are broken up with headlines. Give them all the crucial info at the top as though you’re designing a short landing page, then write the rest. Include the FIRST call to action button in the fold, then continue with the rest of the copy. Tell your compelling story. Add testimonials or a step-by-step example of what they could experience. Add a video with a transcription of optimized copy underneath it.

Remember to break up your landing page copy with visual elements such as infographics, charts, photos, videos, even an embedded audio. You should always consider first who your target market is and what types of content they would embrace–for example, if your market are corporate managers, they probably can’t watch a video at work and they probably live and breathe numbers, so include different graphics or stats.

Again, every word counts. Every sentence MUST compel the reader to move on to the next sentence. Envision the landing page as its own journey with a personal story, a challenge, a hero, a climactic moment, a solution, what happened after, etc.

Use a 2-Step Landing Page

Using a two-step landing page keeps people from feeling overwhelmed. You can use a short page with a 2-button option, creating a “Choose Your Own Adventure” experience (which you most likely experience when you landing on the Bright Planning home page). One button leads to “Read More” and the other button leads to “Buy Now.” The Read More button gives them the longer landing page copy on the same item/service you’re selling.

Use a Story Book Landing Page

Divide up your long form landing page into mini chapters like a story book, so that your calls to action are re-worded in some form of, “Click to find out what happened next,” or “Continue to next chapter,” or “What did So and So do next?” The story book has an early call to action to jump out of the story and buy/commit to something, and it has a final call at the end of the story to buy/commit to something.

How to Measure Your Landing Page Performance

If you want to know how well your landing page is performing, set up Events in Google Analytics or your preferred analytics program.

Set up different conversion points to see how far people get in the copy, especially if you’re using a 2-Step or Storybook Landing Page content design.

Use heat mapping. Heat mapping services, such as Crazy Egg, Hotjar, or ClickTale can graphically show you in color where people are getting distracted or jumping off the page. You can tighten copy, replace elements, or move copy around.

Do user-testing videos. User testing will record a user talking aloud while they explore your landing page copy and saying what works, what doesn’t, and what is boring or confusing.